Dirty Secrets of Car Design

Editor’s note: HOT ROD staffer Thom Taylor is a renowned designer of custom hot rods. He prefers to keep a low profile, but I asked him to write this story from the unique perspective of a guy who dreamed up a car from scratch, then watched as it became reality. —DF

If you want to design cars, and your talent, drive, and sense of humor are sufficient to get you into design school, instructors will warn you that the opportunity to design an entire car—as you see it in your mind—will not happen. There are myriad obstacles that wedge themselves into the process of creating a car, whether it be a one-off, such as Ashley Webb Taulbert’s roadster before you, or a car to be mass produced. The list of obstacles could fill an issue of HOT ROD.

1/16For me it’s pretty amazing that this profile matches the rendering I did almost exactly three years prior. Folks, that doesn’t happen often. About the only deviation is the elimination of the ’32 Ford feature line in the frame that we initially thought might be cool to include. I can live without it. The top of the windshield measures a scant 38 inches to the ground.

It’s a process fraught with compromise, accommodations, feasibility problems, starts and stops, egos, and more. But if you get to design an entire car, and you’re able to juggle those obstacles until a real car is born, it’s a buzz. I’ve had the distinct fortune to design a number of cars from scratch—from my head—with varying degrees of success. None has been more rewarding than Ashley’s little black highboy.

The obstacles should have been exponentially compounded with the three knuckleheads involved in the process of creating this car—all stubborn and cock-sure, with Ashley’s father, Dan, leading the parade. Dan Webb has built numerous cars over the years, including the Ridler Award winner for 1991, his ’32 highboy roadster. He’s notable in Detroit for the cutaway engines, cars, and components he creates for Ford Motor Co., working at his home shop in Burton, Michigan, with his right-hand man Tracey Aitken. He can be difficult. I’ve seen him be difficult—I mean in your face, off-the-wall difficult—but he and I just seem to click. He’s one of those souls, like the late hot rod artist Dave Bell, who maintains a huge mental library of jokes, delivered at will. Always entertaining, Dan’s one of the most talented people I have met in a life full of meeting talented people.

2/16This is the original rendering completed after Dan lit on a sketch he really liked. It was hard in the beginning to determine how new he wanted to go with the design, versus keeping traditional elements and body surfaces. With the rear tank and proportions the car is very removed from an original ’32 Ford, yet incorporates stock ’32 hinges and body reveals. The line drawings above are the four-view plans discussed in the text.

The same holds true for the second guy, metal fabricator Craig Naff, though his personality is the complete opposite of Dan’s. Able to form sheetmetal or aluminum and make it look like it was stamped, he quietly works away in his home shop in Woodstock, Virginia, perfecting whatever it is he’s laboring over. He came to prominence doing the stitch-and-fab rolling sculpture that is CadZZilla, but he’s done too many other cars over the years to count, including one of the Great Eight contenders at the Detroit Autorama just last year.

And then there’s me. I don’t have to delve into my dysfunctional background, because I’m writing this. Plus, my shrink says I can’t possibly get ahead in life unless I believe I am perfectly awesome.

Dan drove and coordinated this exercise from the beginning. First, he had the money and expertise to fabricate most of what you see. Second, he knew what he wanted to a certain degree, and if he didn’t know, he knew where to find it. And lastly, he had the personality and fortitude to see it through to completion—something not everybody possesses. Think about all of those stalled projects you know about collecting dust in garages and shops. Completing the buildup of anything can be a big deal.

3/16

Dan and I talk often on the phone, and over the years have marveled over Indy car and engine designer Harry Miller’s output of amazing race cars in the early 20th century. In our minds, Miller has never been matched in machining skills and component designs, especially with his race cars. We wondered what Miller would be up to if he were alive today, and what he’d build if he were into hot rods.

Doing a hot rod the way we imagined Miller would was the underlying thread in this project. It would have to include some aspect of the distinctive Miller nose, but also needed the look of a track roadster amped up on amphetamines. Early sketches were just too far out for Dan, but as a designer, I will sometimes start at the whacked-out range of the spectrum and work my way back to some form of reality.

4/16<strong>01. </strong>The 5-inch-dropped front axle was fabbed by Webb and utilizes modified early Ford spindles, leather wrapped Posie quarter elliptic springs, chrome-moly radius rods by Webb, and a Strange Top Fuel rack-and-pinion steering unit. Unnecessary frame horns maintain the early rod look, though a huge relief in the frame was required for the axle.

One element Dan likes and wanted to see as part of the design is the upper part of a ’32 Ford roadster, and how it ties into the doors. I decided to take that literally and imagined a fabricator using the cowl, doors, and quarters from a ’32 roadster as a start. If you look at the finished car, you can see the majority of the doors and cowl look like they came right off a Deuce roadster, though Dan created these from 18-gauge flat sheetmetal. With the ’32 elements and the Miller-esque grille dictating the design, and knowing that Dan wanted a track roadster–looking car, I started to visually fill in the blanks.

The taper in the frame is exaggerated, as are the tires and wheels. We knew we wanted 20-inch wheels for the rear to get the satirized rake, and we both chose a rather arbitrary 100 inches for the wheelbase, which in my scale drawings was shortened to 98 inches, ultimately ending up back to 100 inches for the final version. The hood length would be more than enough to accommodate the four-banger Dan had in mind for a motor.

It took relatively few revisions of the sketch before we hit on a direction, and a final rendering showing the car in black was drawn—then it was on to the scale drawings. I have found over the years that, while there are many designers plying their trade, few have the ability to take a design and put it into four views with sections drawn every foot or so, giving the metal fabricator a guide from which to work. Without that, a completely scratch-built body can turn into a disaster. I have been involved with numerous projects in which there was neither the time nor the money for this step, and for the most part I haven’t been happy with the outcome—and for some I won’t even take the credit/blame. When you have people as talented as Dan and Craig turning your vision into a reality, it’s best to give them as much information as you can—and the best information, in my estimation, is that four-view scale drawing. A car owner might spend what could be in the millions of dollars to see a design become reality, so detailed drawings ensure there can be no deviation. If it’s a lower-priced project—like this particular roadster—there may not be funds to fly the designer back and forth to check on the shapes during the buildup, so with the four-view details, the designer is really on the sidelines once the drawings are completed.

5/16<strong>02. </strong> Yes, those are friction shocks—designed by Webb and machined by Tribal Motor Works in Traverse City, Michigan. If you look closely you’ll notice they house the brake lines running right through the center. Chrome was kept to an absolute minimum on all components.

Once Dan was happy with the design, we had the scale drawings blown up and he began fabricating the frame on his frame table. Having the wheels and tires, engine, and dimensions gives a basic framework to work around, requiring little guesswork for the end product. It’s a shame that the body can’t be easily removed to display the frame—it’s a piece of art unto itself. Tapered crossmembers feature belled lightening holes. The rails were made of 0.090-inch chrome-moly plate, all TIG-welded.

With paper drawings, the next step would usually be to create a section buck over which the body maker starts hammering sheetmetal. With digital, it’s even easier to get your sections with the output tied into a cutter that precisely follows the digitally drawn sections, even notching them for attachment to a spine or central backbone. I wasn’t doing that back in the early 2000s when this project was first started, but have relied on it in recent times.

For this project, Dan didn’t use a buck. With the body mimicking the characteristics of a ’32 Ford so closely, and with the full-scale drawings, Dan started working metal to form the cowl, then the doors, and ultimately the floor and trans tunnel. His tools of the trade include a planishing hammer, Pullmax, English wheel, and a lot of cursing. Once the main body was created it was attached to the frame and shipped off to Craig for the hood, seats, and forming of the rear section—which Dan welded and finished due to time constraints with the ’05 SEMA Show fast approaching and Ford having a space reserved in its booth for the car.

6/16<strong>03. </strong> Creating almost a revival in painted wire wheels are these 17-inch Classic II Daytons (which are true knock-offs) wrapped in Pirelli P Zero Corsa tires hand-cut for the roadster. These wheels were originally created by Dayton for Harry Miller’s race cars, and they have the original drawings to prove it. Available in their wheel lines for years, once Dan found out about the Miller connection we had to have them on the car.

Craig also created the nose in stainless steel plated in polished nickel. Dan and Craig told everyone it was “German silver” because it is virtually impossible to form real German silver to the extent that was necessary to create the nose, and so they wanted to jerk around some of the other body builders and fab guys. It’s a fabricator thing, I guess. Additionally, he whittled the flowing windshield posts exactly as I drew them.

For go, Dan wanted the smallest four-banger he could find—one that would look like something from Harry Miller’s shop today. He stumbled across a Zakspeed 2.3L collecting dust in a friend’s shop. These started life in ’80s T-Birds here, and Merkurs in Europe. The forged pistons were machined with valve reliefs for the Zakspeed twin-cam head. It was a work of art, but this engine had seen better days. As Dan describes it, “Tortured to death—a real piece of junk.” Yet he liked how exotic and compact it looked, deciding it would look better if he spun the head 180 degrees to get the exhaust on the passenger side. So now the intake ports house the exhaust valves, with the intake-valve pockets sleeved for the exhaust valves. Says Dan, “It sounds difficult and we expected it to be, but it was so easy we thought we made a mistake.”

7/16<strong>04. </strong> The Ford Zakspeed 2.3L Ford four-cylinder is rated at 400 hp. The cam cover, pulleys, and miscellaneous brackets were all machined by Webb. Different finishes include gun bluing and assorted shades of black anodizing—notice that none of the finishes are polished aluminum or chrome, a pleasant departure.

Compression is 12.5:1, the cams are reversed side to side, and it will easily spin to 7,500 rpm. The induction is a one-off EFI set up by FAST. Dan converted the engine to a dry sump utilizing a Peterson oil pump to lose height, allowing it to sit low in the saddle. He machined the new pan and also the cam covers with bucket actuators. Horsepower is right at 400. “It sounds like an angry mosquito,” Dan says with a laugh. Also note the XRP hoses and fittings, “just like the IndyCars use.”

8/16<strong>05. </strong> XRP hoses and fittings are by Earls of Indy, Indianapolis. When this engine was first fired up at Schroeder’s in Burbank, California, it sounded like someone put a microphone in front of a cat right before stomping on its tail repeatedly.

The transmission is a Tremec T-5, directing power to a one-off quickchange Dan designed on CAD before Tribal Motor Works machined it from billet aluminum. Strange floating axles are attached to floating hubs machined by Dan. Brakes are twin Strange calipers gripping 14-inch rotors from JMA Tool. Hand-made friction shocks dampen the corners. A Top Fuel dragster rack-and-pinion unit handles steering.

Is this thing cartoony? Sure! Is that what we wanted? You betcha! Is it polarizing? I’m not sure, but what I know is that the designs I have done over the years that satisfy me the most tend to be polarizing. I get more enjoyment over people’s reactions when they are strong one way or the other. I’m not insulted if somebody doesn’t like something I’ve designed—it’s not a verdict about me—it’s just how the car strikes him or her.

And what about Ashley, the recipient of the roadster? She’s grown up around Philistines like myself all of her life. As Dan says, “She’s got a lot of car-uncles.” A single dad, for better or worse Dan’s dragged Ashley to every car show with every car-dude he knows since Ashley was a small child. “She’s always been involved with what I’ve done, and all I’ve done is cars,” says Dan unapologetically. She knows everyone in the hot rod world and has an eye for what’s good and what’s not. Continues Dan, “I kept her involved throughout the build. She wrenched on the car and rubbed out parts. I feel it gave her value seeing something go from nothing to something.” Ashley recently married GM Engineer Corey Taulbert, and they finished his ’32 high boy in time for their honeymoon. Corey’s got a tough road ahead as Ashley’s “car uncles” are poised if he makes a wrong move with her.

9/16<strong>06. </strong> The grille bars and surrounding bead mimics a ’32 Ford grille insert. What you can’t see is a V-shaped, three-core radiator Webb made from aluminum, attached to Be Cool Radiator core, offering more cooling surface and more space for packaging components.

I finished the rendering of Ashley’s roadster right before visiting an ailing Gray Baskerville, and brought a copy with me to leave with him so he could give me his thoughts the next time I saw him. He loved it and said it should get built. Unfortunately we never got that second together as he died a week later. I think it meant a lot to both Dan and Ashley that Gray was as enthusiastic as he was about the car. That’s the other buzz about designing cars—bringing a little pleasure and entertainment to others who enjoy cars as much as we all do.

Second Opinion: Mike Ring of Ring Bros.

“We’ve never built hot rods—they all look the same to us, you know, different colors and different wheels. For me old cars just don’t stand out. When we first saw Ashley’s roadster at the SEMA Show we didn’t know Dan or Ashley Webb. But seeing this car we really took notice. I couldn’t relate it to anything I had seen before—it was simple yet cool. It was so clean—there’s no frills. Like the grille or the windshield posts, being handmade and all, I thought it was amazing. The whole car is amazing.

13/16Bomber seats were fabbed by Naff and feature orange leather inserts by Sid Chavers. Notice the exposed body structure, and that there are no interior side panels. The insides of the doors are lined with black leather à la Ferrari. Webb machined all the handles, shifter, steering wheel and pedals in billet aluminum. Notice how the door tops and cowl shape mimic a ’32 Ford roadster.

“Later, when I met Dan, I was surprised that he didn’t put himself on a pedestal. You can tell one of his cars—the cars he builds are the cars he builds—they have his certain style to them. We are all attracted to certain cars, and for Dan he brings his unique spin on them. The difference between Dan and other builders is that he can do it without customers—he’s building these cars for himself so he builds what he wants.”

Third Opinion: Troy Trepanier, Rad Rods by Troy

“I first met Dan in 1992 at Cobo Hall at the Autorama. He’s done more SEMA projects for Ford than just about anybody—besides all of the cutaway engines and components. Actually, he does a little bit of everything at his shop in Michigan. We’re always kidding each other—we have the same type of personality. One year he presented me with a ribbon—for 14th place!

“The thing I respect most about Dan is not his car building, though it’s amazing, but how he’s raised a smart, personable and respected daughter. We need that in this industry. He’s kept her involved. We don’t talk much about cars when we get together; we talk about our kids because I have three. People see the car stuff but don’t see the personal side. He’s done a great job of splitting two worlds—he’s maintained a good leg in the industry while raising a great kid.

“The styling of his cars is just bitchin’. What he’s doing with cars like the Golden Submarine where he’s reimagining history is cool, along with re-creating history with cars like the [So-Cal] streamliner and the Remington Lakester. As builders we want to create our own history, so it’s cool that he’s re-creating old history while doing his own stuff. I have had the pleasure of hanging out with Alex Xydias, and we were at a book signing once and he was really excited about the streamliner Dan was re-creating. I think it’s all bitchin’.”